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A new ad urges viewers to cancel DirectTV and keep the Weather Channel.

The Weather Channel vs. DirectTV

By Dylan Byers

02/12/14 03:08 PM EST

A new advertisement from The Weather Channel targets DirectTV.

While Winter Storm Pax approaches the Washington area, The Weather Channel has been engaged in a fierce battle with DirectTV following a contract dispute that's left 20 million Americans -- one-fifth of TWC's potential audience, according to Fortune -- without access to the leading weather news provider.

The fight, which started after TWC demanded higher fees, falls a bit outside our wheelhouse -- much as we love storm-tracking -- but there are some interesting and, shall we say, entertaining political elements worth noting.

After dropping TWC in early January, DirectTV replaced it with a Colorado-based channel called WeatherNation, which lacks the production quality and professionalism of TWC, to say the least. It also appears to provide unbalanced coverage, geographically speaking, which has not gone unnoticed by D.C. lawmakers. Over the weekend, Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa took to Twitter to voice his frustration:

@WeatherNation I've been watching for 2hrs, When u do Midwest ?I've seen west coast and New England 3 times I'm getting impatient4 Iowa

Meanwhile, WeatherNation may become the subject of a Federal Communications Commission investigation because -- we kid you not -- its closed-captioning system has confused "Haigler" (a town in Nebraska, pop. 158) with "Hitler" and "at you" (as in, "these snowflakes 'will come right at you'") with "a--holes."

In a lengthy letter to the FCC, TWC executive vice president and general counsel George D. Callard called for an investigation into WeatherNation's "incomprehensible closed captioning."

Callard has a point: In one instance, this -- “But these are huge. In Worthington, Ohio, my goodness, this will come right at you. It almost looks like a hay bales rolled up. Another shot there, another angle. And you can see multiple ones of different sizes" -- becomes:

It is for you ridge in warning to the lab my goodness this will come right a--holes to get a bill rolled up another shot there another angle and easy multiple ones of different sizes.

You can imagine the confusion a deaf man might feel, or the sense of fear he would incur from learning that there would be "some orange flames as we head into the weekend" in Chicago (original: "up towards Flint.")